Indexes to British Columbia's publicly released historic birth, marriage and death registrations can be viewed on the Internet through the BC Archives web site at http://www.vs.gov.bc.ca/genealogy/microfilm.html. On this web site, family history researchers can search by name, date and place to find:

• birth registrations 1872-1885 (at least 120 years after the date of birth)
• marriage registrations 1872-1930 (at least 75 years after the date of marriage) and
• death registrations 1872-1985 (at least 20 years after the date of death).

These timeframes are consistent with the protection of privacy provisions in the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act (Section 36) governing disclosure of personal information for historical or archival purposes.

Copies of the original registration documents of these vital records are available on microfilm at various libraries and genealogical centres in British Columbia, including the BC Archives Reading Room in Victoria. The list of microfilm locations can be found on the Vital Statistics web site at http://www.vs.gov.bc.ca/genealogy/microfilm.html.

There are a small number of registrations listed on the web site indexes that are not currently available to the public on microfilm. These events were registered some time after the event occurred and are on microfilm reels which are not yet publicly releasable.

Download the form to order microfilm sets and microfiche.